A Stone Creek Collection Volume 1

by Linda Lael Miller

  “You’re not going to be able to keep up this charade much longer, Sarah,” Doc told her quietly. “Ephriam’s condition is deteriorating. Heartbeat’s sporadic, and there are other bad signs, too. He’ll need a nurse soon—if the town had a hospital, I’d have him admitted, for an indefinite length of time.”

  “Is he dying?” Sarah could barely force the words out. An only child, conceived late in her parents’ lives—they’d both been forty when she was born—she’d never achieved true independence from them. Except when she’d attended college in Philadelphia, she’d never been away from home.

  Doc patted her hand, smiled sadly. “We’re all dying. Life is invariably fatal. But to answer your question, Ephriam could live another twenty years, or never awaken from the nap he’s taking right now. The point is, he’s suffering from dementia, and folks are bound to take notice, if they haven’t already.”

  Nothing Doc said came as a surprise to Sarah, but she still needed a few choked moments to absorb it. She’d spent so much time and effort hiding and denying the problem that facing the truth was a challenge.

  Doc put a fatherly arm around her shoulders. “You’ve fought the good fight, Sarah,” he said. “Run that bank as well as any man could, better than most. But it’s time to let it go.”

  “You don’t understand, Doc,” Sarah answered miserably, wringing her hands in her lap. “Papa and I will have nothing to live on, if his salary stops coming in.”

  “Ephriam has always been the thrifty sort,” Doc said, a frown puckering the flesh between his bristly eyebrows. “He must have saved a considerable amount, over thirty years.”

  Sarah’s eyes burned. “There were bad loans, Doc, a couple of years back, during the worst of the drought. Papa used his own money to cover them, so the Weatherbys and the Connors and the Billinghams wouldn’t lose their ranches—”

  A muscle ticked in Doc’s jaw. “And of course they never paid him back.”

  “They couldn’t,” Sarah insisted. “Now that the railroad’s come as far as Stone Creek, things are getting better, but you know Mrs. Weatherby’s a widow now, with four young children to feed, and the Connors got burned out and had to go live with their folks up in Montana. They might or might not be able to make a new start. Jim Billingham pays what he can, when he can, but it isn’t much.”

  “Oh, Lord,” Doc said. “Is the house mortgaged?”

  Sarah shook her head. “The deed’s in my name,” she answered. She looked back over one shoulder at the big house, the only home she’d ever known. There were six bedrooms, in total, because her parents had hoped to have that many children, or more. “I suppose I could take in boarders,” she said. “Give piano lessons.”

  Doc lowered his arm from Sarah’s shoulder and took her hand, squeezed it lightly. “You’re the sort who’ll do whatever has to be done,” he said fondly. “Ephriam’s lucky to have a daughter like you.”

  Privately, Sarah believed her father would have been better off with a son, instead of a daughter. If she’d been born male, there’d be no question of giving up control of the Stockman’s Bank—a man would be allowed, even expected, to take over the helm.

  Sarah didn’t mind hard work, but taking in boarders was one step above beggary, in small, gossipy communities like that one. There were already several women offering piano lessons, so pupils would be hard to come by. She’d be pitied and whispered about, and keeping her spine straight and her chin up in public would take some doing.

  “You could always get married,” Doc said. “Any one of several men in this town would put a ring on your finger, if you were agreeable.”

  Wyatt Yarbro ambled into Sarah’s mind, grinning.

  She blushed. The man was a self-confessed outlaw, despite the badge pinned to his shirt, and for all that he’d walked her home the night before, and stopped by the bank that very day to offer his assistance, should it be required, marriage wouldn’t enter his mind.

  Men like Mr. Yarbro didn’t marry, they dallied with foolish women, and then moved on.

  “I’d have to love a man before I could marry him,” she told Doc forthrightly. Although she would have married Charles Langstreet the day she met him, and certainly after she discovered she was carrying his child—if he hadn’t admitted, after Owen’s conception, that he already had a wife.

  “Love might be a luxury you can’t afford, Sarah Tamlin,” Doc said. “You’re a strong, capable woman, but the reality is, you need a man.” His weary old eyes twinkled. “I’d offer for you, myself, if I were thirty years younger.”

  Sarah chuckled, though she was dangerously near tears. “And I’d probably accept,” she said, rising to her feet. She had things to do—look in on her father, start supper for her guests, due to arrive in just under an hour, tidy up the parlor and lay a nice table in the dining room. She said as much, adding, “Will you stay and join us?”

  Doc Venable stood, too. “I’d be honored,” he said.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  OWEN’S FACE WAS SCRUBBED, and someone, probably Charles, had slicked down his hair. Standing on the front porch, gazing earnestly up at Sarah, he held out a bouquet of flowers and bravely announced, “Papa said to tell you he’ll be along as soon as he can. He got a telegram at the hotel, and he’s got to answer it.”

  “C-come in,” Sarah said, stricken by the sight, the presence, of this boy. Accepting the flowers with murmured thanks, she stepped back to admit him.

  Owen moved solemnly over the threshold, a little gentleman in a woolen suit, taking in the entryway, the long-case clock, the mahogany coat tree. Sarah wondered if he ever wore regular clothes and played in the dirt, like other children his age.

  And she wondered a thousand other things, too.

  “Let’s put these flowers in water,” she said, and started for the kitchen.

  “You have gaslights and everything,” Owen marveled, walking behind her. “I thought you’d live in a log cabin, and there’d be Indians around.”

  Sarah smiled to herself. “There are a few Indians,” she said. “But you don’t have to worry about them. They’re friendly.”

  “Good,” Owen said, with evident relief, as they passed the dining room table—she’d set it for five, since her father was snoring away in his room—and the plates, glasses and silverware sparkled. “I wouldn’t want to get scalped or anything.”

  “Nobody’s going to scalp you,” Sarah said, with certainty.

  Owen pulled back a chair at the kitchen table and sat while she found a vase for the wild orange poppies he’d apparently picked for her. “Papa says this is the frontier,” he announced.

  Sarah’s spine tightened briefly at the mention of Charles. She hoped Doc Venable would be back from his evening rounds before he or Wyatt Yarbro arrived. “We’re quite civilized, actually,” she said, pumping water into a vase at the sink, dunking the stems of the poppies, and setting the whole shooting match in the center of the table.

  “Do you live in this great big house all by yourself?” Owen wanted to know. He was small for his age, Sarah noticed, trying her best not to devour the child with her eyes. His feet swung inches above the floor, but he sat up very straight.

  “No,” Sarah said, taking a chair herself. “My father and I live here together. Isn’t your house much bigger than this one?”

  Owen allowed that it was, then added, “But I’m not there very much. If I’m not at school, I mostly stay with Grandmama. She’s got all sorts of money, but she lives in a town house. That way, she doesn’t need so many servants.”

  “Do you like staying at your grandmama’s town house?” Sarah asked carefully.

  “Not much,” Owen said. “You can’t run or make noise or have a dog, because dogs have fleas and they chew things up and make messes.”

  Sarah didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. “Would you like t
o have a dog?”

  “More than anything, except maybe a pony,” Owen answered.

  “Do you like school?” A thousand other questions still pounded in Sarah’s mind, but it wouldn’t be appropriate to ask them.

  “It’s lonesome,” Owen said. “Especially at Christmas.”

  Sarah stomach clenched, but she allowed none of what she felt to show in her face. “You stay at school over Christmas?”

  “My mother doesn’t like me very much,” Owen confided. “And Grandmama always goes to stay with friends in the south of France when the weather starts getting cold.”

  “Surely your mother loves you,” Sarah managed.

  “No,” Owen insisted, shaking his head. “She says I’m a bastard.”

  Sarah closed her eyes briefly, struggling with a tangle of emotions—anger, frustration, sorrow, and the most poignant yearning. So Marjory Langstreet did blame Owen for her husband’s indiscretions, as she’d always feared she might.

  “My brothers aren’t bastards,” Owen went on, taking no apparent notice of Sarah’s reaction.

  “Do you get along with them?” she asked, after biting her lower lip for a few moments, lest she say straight out what she thought of Marjory and all the rest of the Langstreets. “Your brothers, I mean?”

  “They’re old,” Owen replied. “Probably as old as you.”

  Sarah chuckled. “My goodness,” she said. “They must be doddering.”

  “What’s doddering?”

  Just then, her father appeared on the rear stairway leading down into the kitchen, clad in a smoking jacket and the military trousers Sarah had hidden earlier. His feet were bare, and his white hair stood out all around his head. He’d forgotten his spectacles, and he peered at Owen.

  “Doddering,” he said, “is what I am. An old fool who can’t get around without somebody to hold him up.”

  “Papa,” Sarah said, rising, “you’re supposed to be in bed.”

  “Balderdash,” Ephriam snapped. “It’s still light out. Who’s the lad?”

  “My name is Owen Langstreet, sir,” Owen said, standing respectfully in the presence of an elder. “Who are you?”

  Don’t, Papa, Sarah pleaded silently. “This is my father, Ephriam Tamlin,” she said aloud.

  “Those pants,” Owen observed, “are peculiar. How come they have yellow stripes down the side?”

  “I wore these trousers in the great war,” Ephriam blustered. Then he saluted briskly. “You’re a mite small for a soldier. Reckon you must be a drummer boy.”

  “Papa,” Sarah pleaded. “Please.”

  “I smell supper cooking,” Ephriam told her. She’d fried chicken earlier; it was on a platter in the warming oven. “I’m hungry.”

  “I’ll bring you a plate,” Sarah promised. “Just go back to bed.”

  “I’m not a soldier,” Owen said.

  A rap sounded at the back door, and Doc Venable let himself in. Spotting Ephriam standing there on the stairs, he tossed Sarah a sympathetic glance, let his eyes rest briefly on Owen, then went to usher his old friend to his room.

  “How come Ephriam can’t eat with us?” Owen asked Sarah, when they’d gone. He looked so genuinely concerned that it was all Sarah could do not to reach out and ruffle his neatly brushed hair.

  “He’s sick,” Sarah said.

  “Why did he call me a drummer boy? I don’t have a drum.”

  “Figure of speech,” Sarah answered.

  At that instant, for good or ill, someone turned the bell knob at the front door, indicating the arrival of another supper guest.

  “I’ll answer the door!” Owen said, and rushed off through the dining room.

  Sarah gripped the back of a chair, swayed. She should have told Charles, when he invited himself to supper, that it wasn’t a good time for her to entertain. Her father was indisposed, and she was frantic with worry over the situation at the bank. But she’d wanted so to pass an evening in Owen’s company.

  “It’s the deputy!” Owen shouted from the entry hall. “Should I let him in?”

  Sarah laughed, though her eyes stung with tears. She hurried out of the kitchen and through the dining room.

  Wyatt Yarbro stood smiling and spruced up just over the threshold. He wore a clean white shirt, black trousers, and polished boots, and the holster on his hip was empty. He’d dusted off his black hat, which he held politely in his hands, and his dark eyes danced with a sort of somber amusement.

  “Do come in, Mr. Yarbro,” Sarah said. “This is my—nephew. Owen Langstreet.”

  “We’ve met,” Mr. Yarbro said, stepping past the boy, who stared up at him in fascination.

  “He’s not Wyatt Earp,” Owen said.

  “I’m aware of that, Owen,” Sarah replied, gesturing toward the coat tree, with its many brass hooks. “Hang up your hat, Mr. Yarbro.”

  Wyatt did as she’d asked.

  An awkward silence fell.

  “Let’s have a seat in the parlor,” Sarah said, flustered, leading the way.

  Owen followed, and so did Wyatt.

  “Nice place,” Wyatt said.

  “She lives here with her papa,” Owen informed him, gravitating toward Sarah’s piano, which was her most prized possession. “He wears blue pants with yellow stripes on them and thinks I’m a drummer boy.”

  “Is that so?” Wyatt asked affably, and when Sarah dared to look back over her shoulder, she saw that he was watching her, not the child.

  “Sit down,” Sarah said. “Please. I’ll get some coffee.”

  “No need,” Wyatt said, waiting until Sarah sank into her mother’s threadbare slipper chair before taking a seat on the settee. He was leanly built, but the house seemed smaller somehow, with him in it, and warmer.

  Much warmer.

  Owen perched on the piano stool. “May I spin?” he asked.

  Wyatt chuckled.

  “Spin all you want,” Sarah said, smiling a wobbly smile.

  Owen moved the stool a few more inches from the piano, sat, gripped it with both hands, and used one foot to propel himself into blurry revolutions.

  Sarah felt dizzy and had to look away, but her gaze went straight to Wyatt Yarbro, and that made her even dizzier. He’d shaved, and his cologne had a woodsy scent. His white shirt was open at the throat, and it was not only pressed, but starched, too.

  Wyatt glanced curiously around the well-appointed, seldom-used room. “Where’s Mr. Langstreet?” he asked.

  “He’s been delayed,” Sarah said.

  Owen used his foot to stop the piano stool. He looked happily flushed, more like the little boy he was than the miniature man who blithely referred to himself as a “bastard.” “He got a telegram,” Owen said importantly.

  “Imagine that,” Wyatt said, though not unkindly.

  “In Philadelphia, we have a telephone,” Owen added.

  “Don’t hold with telephones myself,” Wyatt replied, mischief sparking in his dark eyes. “I figure if folks have something to say to each other, they ought to write it in a letter or meet up, face-to-face.”

  “Papa says someday everybody will have a telephone.”

  “Does he, now?” Wyatt asked easily.

  As though to speak of the devil was to conjure him, Charles chose that moment to ring the doorbell. Sarah excused herself to answer, and Wyatt stood when she rose from her chair.

  He might have been an outlaw, but someone had taught him manners.

  Sarah was a little flushed when she opened the front door to Charles.

  “Good evening, Sarah,” he said, stepping past her when she hesitated to move out of the way. “I apologize for being late. Business. One can never escape it.”

  Doc Venable descended the front stairs, rolling down his shirtsleeves. H
is hands and forearms still glistened with moisture from the sink upstairs, where he must have washed up for supper.

  Sarah made introductions all around, out of deference to the doctor. Wyatt and Charles had already met; Wyatt’s expression thoughtful, Charles’s elegantly aloof.

  Charles looked down on Wyatt, Sarah realized, as a ruffian, and she felt a swift sting of fury. Her cheeks throbbed with it.

  Supper seemed interminable. Sarah was afraid, every moment, that her father would appear, oddly dressed and confounded.

  “I thought you said you couldn’t cook,” Wyatt teased, helping himself to another piece of fried chicken and then adding gravy to his mashed potatoes. “Tastes fine to me.”

  “Thank you,” Sarah said, inordinately pleased and not a little embarrassed. By some miracle, she’d managed not to burn the chicken, and the mashed potatoes were thicker than the gravy, as they were supposed to be.

  Charles maintained a chilly silence; he clearly resented Wyatt’s presence, tossing a disdainful glance his way every now and then. Finally, he took a sip from his water goblet and condescended to remark, “Very nice.”

  “Is Aunt Sarah your sister, Papa?” Owen asked.

  “Eat your supper,” Charles told him.

  “Is she?”

  “No,” Charles snapped.

  “Then she must be Mother’s sister. They don’t look anything alike.”

  Sarah stiffened in her chair. Wyatt saw the motion, and stared diplomatically down at his plate.

  “In Sarah’s case,” Charles said, plainly irritated and red at the jawline, “the title of ‘aunt’ is honorary. She’s—a family friend.”

  “Oh,” Owen said, looking dejected. He laid his fork down. He’d been sawing away at a drumstick for the last twenty minutes; Sarah had wanted to tell him it was all right to eat chicken with his fingers, but refrained. “I was thinking maybe I could visit her at Christmas, but if she’s not really my aunt—”

  “You may visit me whenever you want,” Sarah told him, aware that she was overstepping, and not caring. When she got Charles alone, she’d have a word with him about this “bastard” business, and leaving a ten-year-old boy at boarding school over the holidays.